As a book title, "How To Make $100,000 Farming 25 Acres" is not
exactly a modest proposal, especially in these times in the farm
economy. Booker T. Whatley, a former horticulture professor at
Tuskegee University, has a plan for the small farmer, and in this
book, with assistance from the editors of NEW FARMmagazine, he tells it.

Whatley is a nationally known expert on the small farm who may be
familiar to readers of MOTHER EARTH NEWS and
ORGANIC GARDENING. In retirement now, he travels the
country giving as many as fifty seminars a year to share the ideas he
has developed for turning the small farm into a profitable
enterprise. Whatley's monthly "Small Farm Technical Newsletter" has
20,000 subscribers in fifty states and twenty-five foreign
countries.

The heart of the book is "The Guru's Ten Commandments"--the
complete model of the successful small farm according to Whatley. He
adopted the nickname after initial amusement over being
being
[sic]
designated a alone guru in Alabama" in a
WASHINGTON POST article several years ago. Indeed, the
parts of the book written by Whatley do exhibit a quality of religious
exhortation, along with sly humor most often directed at government
"experts," and a vast fund of hard-headed common sense and wisdom in
the quirks of human nature.

Whatley's model for the small farm (which he defines as between ten
and 200 acres) is based on crop diversification, careful management,
and aggressive marketing. Whatley says it is impossible for the small
farmer to concentrate on soybeans or cotton on the same basis as
farmers working a thousand acres or more. He suggests that the small
farmer turn instead to a variety of high-value crops, which might
include strawberries, blueberries, grapes, honey, rabbits, lambs, and
quail. The diversification plan should include at least ten different
products, with something available for sale in every month of the
year.

Equally important to Whatley's concept is setting up the small farm
as a "pick your own" operation with a "clientele membership club" of
at least a thousand members; the club provides a guaranteed supply of
customers and a guaranteed annual membership fee in exchange for the
right to buy produce for 60 percent of supermarket prices. To ensure
this membership pool, the farm must be located on a paved road within
forty miles of a population center of at least 50,000 l
persons. Whatley believes that the customers must come to the farm and
he is confident that the availability of homegrown, contaminant-free,
high-quality produce will attract them there.

According to Whatley, the traditional farmers' market is of little
value to the small farmer because too much time and money are tied up
in picking and transporting crops to market. When Whatley talks about
a profitable small farm, he means much more than just subsistence
living. "I see farming as a business, not a lifestyle. I'm talking
about a good living for the farmer, maybe even a Caribbean vacation
once in a while."

The clientele membership club idea is the most controversial of
Whatley's rules and the least frequently tried by farmers who are
adopting some of his ideas, but to Whatley it is an integral and
indispensable part of the model. "The CMC is literally the
lifeblood of your diversified farm... People say it would be so hard
to get 1,000 of these people. My reply to that is, well, everything's
hard. Life is hard."

Whatley's answer is to go after people who share a desire for
healthful produce and are willing to put time into picking and putting
up good food for their families, people who "have the same philosophy
as the ant--they believe in preparing for winter." According to
Whatley, it is the farmer who selects his clientele, and he has only
himself to blame if he does not put enough effort into choosing the
right kind of members.

For the Whatley-style farm to be successful, the farmer must also
be a good salesperson, and the farm should come to play a role in the
lives of its club members. Whatley thinks the farm should be made a
place of beauty which city people can visit with their families to
enjoy a little since of country life. Going out to the farm to pick
vegetables can become a family outing or even a mini-vacation. He
suggests promoting this aspect with such sidelines as picnic areas,
refreshments, and even a petting zoo for the children.

Whatley wants the farmer to foster a sense of ownership among his
club members end to develop a persona! relationship with each of
them. "This whole approach to farming is extremely
people-oriented. You have to like people to do well at it," says
Whatley.

HOW TO MAKE $100,000 actually offers more of a
starting point for small farmers to begin farming successfully than a
step-by-step blueprint. Whatley realizes that it is unlikely that any
farmer will be able or willing to follow all of his "commandments,"
but he believes that many combinations of ideas and plans can come
from his book. Almost half of the book is made up of essays by or
about small farmers who have taken Whatley's basic ideas and tailored
them to fit their particular needs. These farmers are raising kiwi
fruit, shiitake mushrooms, herbs, watercress, trees for
furniture-making, and soybeans for tofu. They are raising sheep for
wool and making cider and goat cheese. They are setting up game
preserves, running gourmet farm restaurants, and renting out bungalows
for country vacations. Whatley seems to enjoy this creative aspect of
his farm model. No detail which might make the farm more profitable is
too small for his attention.

Page 23

The most visible and extensive Whatley-style farm came about as the
result of an article about Whatley which appeared in the Wall Street
Journal in 1984. The day after the article was published, Whatley
received a call from Tom Monaghan, president of Domino's Pizza. The
friendship which developed with Monaghan led to the creation of the
Booker T. Whatley Farm at the corporate headquarters of Domino's Pizza
near Detroit. The farm, which was recently completed, will grow
vegetables to be used on the pizzas as well as serve as a
demonstration project for Whatley's ideas. Monaghan and Whatley also
hope to initiate a summer training program for high school students
interested in becoming farmers.

One segment of the population which Whatley has not been able to
reach satisfactorily so far is the black small farmer. He says that he
has more Canadian subscribers to his newsletter than he has black
subscribers in Alabama. Whatley believes that this is because young
blacks in the South who were children of farmers watched their
families struggle in vain to live off the land and have therefore
looked elsewhere for economic opportunities. Whatley knows of only one
young black farmer who has attempted to set up a farm following his
principles.

While Whatley blames government policy for disinheriting and
ignoring the small farmer, he places much of the responsibility for
success on the farmer himself.

The government needs to get out of agriculture, he says, but the
farmer must learn to be a good manager. "It is my position that the
farm problems of this country will be solved when and only when
mismanagement is made a federal crime....Farmers need to spend less
time on their air-conditioned tractors. What they really need is an
air-conditioned office where they can do their planning, thinking, and
managing." A more valuable machine for the farmer may be the
computer, where he can keep careful records of his customers, crops,
and sales. Whatley has no patience with farmers who "take an
amateurish approach to a serious business."

Whatley truly believes, and many readers will end up believing with
him, that hard work, common sense, creative thinking, and the Guru's
Commandments can't help but produce a profitable small farm. Whatley's
personal goal is no more modest than the title of his book. "I want
to save 100,000 small farms, make them productive and economically
viable. Then I'll be satisfied."

Lyn Frazer is an amateur horticulturist and a bookseller
in Montgomery, Ala.